Factory-Farmed Chickens: Their Difficult Lives and Deaths

More than 9 billion chickens, along with half a billion turkeys, are slaughtered for food in the United States each year. This number represents more than 95 percent of the land animals killed for food in the country. Worldwide, more than 50 billion chickens are raised and slaughtered annually.

Chickens are sociable, intelligent animals. Studies have shown that they are able to solve problems and, unlike young children, grasp the permanence of objects (they understand that objects taken from view continue to exist). Their natural behavior includes living in stable groups of 30 or so that employ a social hierarchy (the origin of the term pecking order). The chickens in a given flock all know and recognize each other. Their communal activities include scratching and pecking for food, running around, taking dust baths, and resting. They crow and chirp in a range of some 30 meaningful vocalizations. Chickens also have a strong urge to nest, and, like most animal mothers, they nurture their young attentively and affectionately. A hen carefully tends her eggs in the nest, turning them up to five times an hour and clucking to them; remarkably, the unborn chicks chirp back to her and to one another. People who have had opportunities to become acquainted with chickens—for example, while growing up on farms or visiting farm-animal sanctuaries—often remark on how affectionate chickens can be and how they seem to have their own personalities.

Through the 1950s, even chickens raised for eventual slaughter were kept in traditional small coops of no more than 60 or so birds, with free access to the outdoors; they could nest, roost, and share space according to their natural behavior. But modern large-scale farming practices (“factory farming”) give chickens no opportunity to behave according to their nature. Quite the contrary—the reality of the life and death of factory-farmed chickens, both those raised for meat and those used to lay eggs, is shocking.

As in all factory-farming industries, chicken production is designed for maximum efficiency and maximum profit. With these goals, regard for the welfare of the animals involved is a luxury that reduces profits unless the extra costs can be passed on to the consumer (as on the much-publicized but less frequently seen “free-range” meat and egg farms). The results are overcrowding, disease, high death rates, and observable unhappiness for the animals involved.

“Broiler” chickens

Many people believe that chicken, especially the breast of the chicken, is healthier to eat than “red meat.” Chicken consumption has consequently risen dramatically over the last few decades as more and more people make the switch. The birds raised for meat, called “broilers” by the industry, are the product of genetic manipulation that has drastically increased breast and thigh tissue (the most popular parts of the animal) and produced a very rapid growth rate that outstrips the development of their legs and organs. Broilers raised in this way are supposed to reach “slaughter weight” at just six or seven weeks of age, but the death toll is very high. The growth of abnormally heavy bodies causes crippling and painful skeletal deformities, and the overburdening of the birds’ underdeveloped cardiopulmonary systems often causes congestive heart failure before they are six weeks old. Some broiler chickens who do not succumb to these problems still die of thirst, because they are physically unable to even reach the water nozzles in their sheds. Other common causes of death pre-slaughter are heat prostration, cancer—in an animal less than seven weeks old—and infectious diseases.

Broiler-chicken facilities tend to be extremely overcrowded, with tens of thousands of birds crammed into a single closed broiler house. Each chicken is given less than a square foot of space, so hardly any floor is actually visible. The birds are unable to roam, to scratch, or, indeed, to avoid each other at all. Their instinct to live in a hierarchical community is thwarted, and social tension results. Chickens living in these stressful conditions will peck and fight with each other, which has led chicken producers to the “solution” of debeaking chicks shortly after they hatch in order to minimize damage. This debeaking process, like much else in factory farming, is run assembly-line fashion, without anesthesia; the chicks are placed beak-first into an apparatus that quickly cuts the tips off the beaks with a hot blade.

It is impossible, in such an atmosphere, to maintain health and cleanliness. The chickens’ excretions pile up, and the resulting ammonia fumes become so strong that they burn the birds’ eyes, and blindness results. Reports from observers say that birds with “ammonia burn” rub their eyes with their wings and emit cries of pain. Other health problems include the proliferation of Salmonella bacteria, which can remain on the slaughtered birds and so frequently cause threats to human health that special chicken-meat handling practices are invariably recommended by health authorities.

Once the chickens have attained slaughter weight, they are loaded into crowded trucks that offer no protection from extreme temperatures, and many birds die as they are shipped to processing facilities. The most efficient of these facilities kill some 8,400 birds per hour, the result of a high degree of automation. Machines run by humans automatically stun the birds, cut their throats, and scald and pluck them. First, human workers strap the live chickens into leg shackles on a moving rail, from which the birds hang upside-down as they move on to baths of electrified water, which stuns them. This is ostensibly for humane purposes, in order to render them insensible before their throats are cut, but some observers believe it is done merely to immobilize them to a degree sufficient to make further processing easier, not to desensitize them. The stunned birds move on to a mechanical blade that cuts their throats. After the chickens bleed out, they are plunged into a scalding bath that removes feathers. Unfortunately, this high-speed assembly-line process contains potential missteps. The voltage in the electrified bath may be too low, resulting in the rapid recovery of the chickens, who are then well aware of the throat-cutting machine as they approach it. The blade misses many chickens, so they consequently are boiled alive in the scalding bath.

Chickens are exempted from the USDA’s Humane Methods of Slaughter Act, which mandates that animals be rendered insensible to pain before being slaughtered. The Humane Society of the United States is one of several organizations lobbying to obtain a requirement that poultry animals not be exempted from legislation that would protect them from painful, sometimes torturous, death.

Egg-laying hens

As bad as conditions are for chickens raised for meat, they are even worse for birds in the egg industry. Erik Marcus, making a comparison to the better-publicized cruelty done to veal calves, says in his book Meat Market: Animals, Ethics, and Money:

I personally believe that the average battery hen has it worse than the average veal calf. I think it’s probable that a forkful of egg comes at a cost of greater suffering than a forkful of veal… For people making a gradual switch to vegetarianism out of concern for animals, I therefore believe that the first food to give up should be, not meat, but eggs.

There are about 300 million laying hens in the United States; of these, some 95 percent are kept in wire battery cages, which allow each hen an average of 67 square inches of space—less than the size of a standard sheet of paper. For perspective, a hen needs 72 square inches of space to be able to stand up straight and 303 square inches to be able to spread and flap her wings. There is no room even for the hens to perform self-comforting behaviors such as preening and bathing. Hens are usually kept eight or nine to a cage; long tiers of these cages are built one upon another in sheds that hold tens of thousands of birds, none of whom has enough room to raise a wing. Excrement falls from the top cages to the lower ones, causing the same “ammonia burn” problem as in the broiler houses. Like chickens raised for meat, laying hens are debeaked as chicks. The hens are deprived of the ability to create nests for their eggs, which instead drop through the wires of the cage for collection. This inability to engage in instinctive behavior causes great frustration.

A sad side effect of the egg-production industry is the wholesale destruction of male chicks, who are useless to the egg industry. These chicks are not used in the meat industry either, because they have not been genetically manipulated for meat production. Male chicks are ground up in batches while still alive, suffocated in trash cans, or gassed.

The methods used to maximize production include manipulation of lighting to change the hens’ environment and hence their biological cycles; unnaturally long periods of simulated daylight encourage laying. Periodic forced molting creates an additional laying cycle: during this time, the hens are kept in darkness and put on a “starvation” diet (reduced-calorie feed) or starved altogether for up to two weeks.

Caged in this way, hens are unable to exercise, and constant egg production leaches calcium from their bones; these two factors cause severe osteoporosis, which leads to broken bones and great pain for the hens. The syndrome is called Cage-Layer Fatigue. Additionally, the wires of the cage injure the feet of the chickens, as the hens must sit in essentially one position their whole lives with their feet pressing into the wires. They rub against the sides of the cage, which causes severe feather loss and skin abrasions. In essence, hens who would normally be able to use their whole bodies and have lives as full as those of any other animal in nature are reduced to immobilized egg-laying machines, existing for that one purpose only.

The hens live like this for about two years or less, until their bodies are exhausted from the stresses of constant laying and their egg production decreases. At that point, they are shipped to slaughter to be turned into animal feed or sometimes human food or are simply discarded. In 2003 a public outcry brought attention to a California ranch that was reported to have discarded thousands of live hens using a wood chipper; no charges were brought because, as it turned out, this is a common industry practice.

What about free-range eggs and meat?

Many people, distressed by learning about these conditions, pledge to eat only “free-range” eggs and meat, which they imagine come from chickens that have free access to the outdoors and fresh air. There are some facilities like that, but in reality, there is no uniform standard for the free-range designation. No regulations exist that describe the size of the outdoor area or the number of birds allowed in a single shed, for example. A free-range chicken facility need only be cage-free and provide “access” to the outdoors through a door. In practice, the facilities may be windowless and as overcrowded as any other, and only a few chickens may ever be able to reach the door at all. Further, the breeds used are likely to be the standard ones used in non-free-range operations: free-range broilers are, like other broilers, bred for such high meat production that the birds are unable to move about freely even if they want to, and both broiler and laying hens are susceptible to the same life-threatening conditions of heart failure and osteoporosis as any other agribusiness chicken.

Free-range laying hens, like all other laying hens, are killed after about a year or two when their egg production drops. They are usually slaughtered under the same conditions described above. Like battery chickens, free-range chickens come from hatcheries that kill the male chicks.

Toward a better future

Movements are afoot across the globe to improve conditions for chickens and other poultry animals. The European Union has agreed to abolish the use of battery cages by 2012. The Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) and other organizations are pushing for such a law, and various states and communities in the United States have passed or are considering similar laws. And there have been other successes. In 2000, McDonald’s Corp. announced new policies that mandate that their suppliers increase space for caged laying hens and stop using forced molting at the facilities that produce their eggs; they also plan to phase out the practice of debeaking. In March 2007 another fast-food giant, Burger King, promised to implement new animal-welfare policies that include provisions for buying a certain percentage of its eggs from cage-free producers and some of its chickens from producers that use more-humane slaughter methods. The supermarket chains Whole Foods and Wild Oats have also moved away from using and selling eggs from caged chickens.

Meanwhile, vegetarians, vegans, and animal-welfare organizations continue to emphasize that meat and egg consumption are not necessary for anyone’s health and that people concerned about animals and ethics should give strong consideration to going vegetarian.

May 4, 2007, was International Respect for Chickens Day, an annual event launched in 2005 by the nonprofit organization United Poultry Concerns (UPC) to “celebrate the dignity, beauty and life of chickens and to protest against the bleakness of their lives in farming operations.” On that day, volunteers in the United States and Canada created displays, handed out information, and took other actions to publicize the miserable conditions in which billions of chickens raised for food spend their lives. UPC was established to address the plight of domesticated fowl used for food production. As UPC puts it, “These birds are the largest number of abused warm-blooded animals in the world. Along with the billions of birds who are slaughtered for ‘food’ each year, millions more suffer in laboratories, get dumped in animal shelters, and die miserably in poultry houses without anyone knowing that they ever lived.”

Books We Like

Meat Market: Animals, Ethics, and Money
Erik Marcus (2005)

Meat Market is at least three kinds of book: an exposé of the modern farmed-animal industry; a strategic guide for a future social movement on behalf of farmed animals; and a compendium of essential information on issues crucially related to farmed-animal rights and welfare, including original assessments of standard arguments against meat eating and animal testing. In vivid yet dispassionate detail Marcus describes the immense suffering of chickens, pigs, dairy cows, and veal calves on factory farms, showing how the miserable conditions in which these poor creatures live and die are the inevitable result of the industrialization of animal agriculture since the mid-20th century and the relentless pressures for ever greater efficiency and profit.

Because it is no longer economically viable to raise farmed animals except in a factory setting (the family farm is long dead), there is no ethically acceptable alternative to the complete “dismantlement” of animal agriculture, as Marcus calls the movement he envisions. Marcus does not underestimate political power of the industry he means to take down: in the United States, corporate meat and dairy producers receive significant taxpayer subsidies and lobby effectively against any reform; they even have an official voice in formulating government guidelines on human nutrition. Yet, as Marcus persuasively argues, the industry is vulnerable to “an honest, accurate message that primarily emphasizes the ethical problems with animal agriculture,” because even the vast majority of meat eaters abhor the cruel treatment of animals and would be revolted by the abusive practices on which animal agriculture is built, if only they knew about them. Meat Market, in one of its guises, is exactly that kind of message.

The book also includes eight supplementary essays by vegan and vegetarian activists, extensive endnotes providing a wealth of additional information and argument, and a list of recommended readings on veganism and farmed-animal protection.

Oh my god this is actually SICK!!!!!!!!!!! I hate the people that do this!!!!! I’ve known about this for quite a while now, I mean for a long time my parents have been buying Free range chicken’s instead of Battery and I will never eat battery again!!! I’m 13 and after seeing these pictures I’m nearly in tears!!!!! You people that do this stuff…I hate you!!!! You have NO right to do this!! You deserve to be treated in just the same way that you treat these chickens you absolute phsychopaths!!!

Ok so it’s actually not the people that do it’s fault, it’s the consumer. The chicken farmers have been forced to produce more and more chicken meat for lower and lower prices. If they don’t, companies will just buy from overseas. They have been forced to produce genetically modified chickens to cater to the greedy consumers needs.

No, it is the fault of the system of capitalism which demands ever increasing markets and production. It is a brutal system based on domination and competition. Being social animals, humans require a system of cooperation. Capitalism is extincting plant and animal life, emptying our seas, polluting our soil, air, and water, and using up all resources at an alarming rate. This is only in about 150 years. Just think what will happen if it keeps going at this rate. Consumers are kept uninformed about what happens behind all industries. Check out child slavery in the chocolate industry.

Your right…but people these days don’t care there cruel, mean, and nasty some people that write comments, in this page don’t care. But what can we do? Tell the bad people to stop there cruelty? No because there do it in secret and will never stop…all they want is money all we can do is try but not hate… Explain to them that what they are doing is terrible and agonizing. Thank you ????

I hate this. I am also 13 and i agree with Rach this is unfair and should be banned. They should be treated with respect and not like a lifeless being. They are alive!!
WE ARE ANIMALS TOO!! and i think people forget that.

I am 13 in 4 weeks and my family rescued 4 battery hens through the British hen welfare trust. You should all do this because the BHWT go in on the day before slaugher and take all the hens. then they rehome them and they are so lovely! they follow you around the garden and go to bed by themselves every night! I am holding one now! she is sooooooo sweetttttt!! i love them so much and next month we are going to help rescue more! plzzz everyone!!!! help them!!!!!

I am 65 and discovered all this not too long ago. My granddaughter and I (she is 8 years old) now raise 3 chickens that we love so much. They have a very good life of great food, veggies, fruit, yogart, tacos, and feed and are only in their coop from sundown to sunup to protect them from predators. The rest of the time they have a lovely green yard to peck around in. They are our wonderful, beautiful pets. They give us eggs, but when they don’t anymore, they will still be our pets. This is the only way I eat eggs now. Their names are Jazzmine, Selena and Primrose. PS I only have 3 because I live in the city and the ordinances limit it to 3.

I have two chickens, Heihei and Frappuchino, and i love them very much. When I saw this, i was horrified. I looked further into it, and i found a MORTIFYING gif of the fate of male chicks. I strongly recommend not looking for this. If you do, don’t say I didn’t warn you.

We raise chickens for the eggs and they are all great pets and it made me so mad when I read all of this about how they treat these poor chickens.If I didn’t raise chickens for the eggs and I read this I would never eat eggs or chicken again

I love chickens I had 5 backyard chickens Katniss (mine), Juliet (my sister’s), Pattie (my brother’s), Cleopatra (my other brother’s), and Victoria (my mom’s) unfortunately they caught a virus and only one survived. She turned out to be a rustier. So we gave him to my Aunt because were I live we cant have rosters. But were she lives you can. Cleopatra the roster is living happily. I remember all of my chickens and I Take care of there graves really well (in my backyard) and visit Cleopatra all the time. I miss my chickens SO much. It is such a pity that the chickens in the factories aren’t cared for and there lives dont matter. I’m a vegetarian. I wish everyone think the same I do. R.I.P. chickens!

I have studied battery Farming for a long time.I rescue Ex-Batt Hens.They are delightful.Considering how they have been treated By Humans ,they very quickly adapt to to Human Kindness.They are sweet ,sensitive ,they take care of each other.I wish with all my heart for all factory Farming to end.Our Group fight for these beautiful Birds who have been so abused and terrorized.We give them loving homes and watch them grow into happy carefree Beings.I watch them carefully however for signs of physical fatigue and sorrow.Sometimes our group lose birds because of the shock to their systems.But still at least they experience a kind hand, instead of cruelty. Each Being born on this earth is entitled by the law of nature to live in peace and freedom free of pain and sorrow .Man does not have the right to decide anyones fate ,least of all such a cruel existence as this.I will carry on rescuing any animal in pain.Lindsay “Windy Brook Rescue.”

i toaltal agree with all animals having a right to live in the conditions they need. i may be only 11 but i am determind to stop the cruelty to animals even if it starts with chickens it is cruel and they deserve a life as much as we do. we dont keep dogs and cats in cages and horrible conditions so why should we keep any other animal in them. please reply i realy want this to stop. thanks xx

Emily, i totally agree i want to be an animal activist when i grow up!!! it is disgusting how they treat them! i turned 11 on the 18th of June Tuesday:) so i am the same age and that probably sounds like i am a creepy psycho psychopath:) lol but the factory farming is NNO laughing matter i am a vegetarian for those reason i hope that everyone will understand eventually:)xx

I think you put this very well, Emily: “all animals [have] a right to live in the conditions they need.” Chickens don’t need to be in cages; it’s humans that need to put them there to turn them into food in the most profitable way possible. Given a choice, no chicken would choose to be boxed up in a wire cage. Thank you for writing.

I have a small farm here in Maine and my chickens are free to roam, have a rooster to lead them around, socialize, build nests and are really having a pretty fabolous life. We sell our eggs straight off the farm and to a farmers market and our customers are welcome to come by our farm and visit the chickens anytime. THIS IS HOW IT SHOULD BE. If you think the life of factory hens is as horrific as do I, and you’re not ready to become a vegan, there are alternatives. Go to a local farmers market and know your farmer! Know where your food is coming from. Even the biggest of cities have weekly farmers markets.

i have pet chickens and love them alot, and i hate seing chickens being treated like animals. i saw on youtube how KFC treat their chickens, it is absalootley sickly! not only do i have PET chickens, but i am a vegiterian.

when i say this i am not a racist or trying to be. so please don’t call me one. the Nazis force Jews to hard work and kill hundreds of them then for even say that didn’t happen you get arrested. but this chicken holocaust (i don’t know what else to call it) is aloud to continue? shoving them full of drugs to grow faster and antibiotics to prevent sickness is just as bad to me. and worse there seems to be no end in sight. Save The Chickens!

Ben, it’s great that you treat your chickens well and are a vegetarian. I wanted to note, though, your use of the phrase “chickens being treated like animals.” It’s interesting, because chickens *are* animals, of course. Notice how, in our language, treating something like an animal means treating it badly; our culture takes that for granted, even though you obviously didn’t mean that the bad treatment of some animals should be expected.

It is so very sad how people can disregard the lives of innocent animals and I wonder HOW can people be so heartless. I like chickens, and have some as pets. They are so smart and each has it’s own unique personality. Every creature deserves a chance to live as nature intended, even if they are domesticated. Chickens feel pain just as acutely as we do, and I can just imagine the feeling of dread and intense pain if I ever walked into one of those “factories.” Thanks for shedding some light on the horrible happenings often hushed up by socety.

I raise chickens for eggs and every year buy about 6 to 8 Cornish rock crosses (broiler chickens)I free range these guys for 5 to 6 months and there ready for butcher. How ever i have farming friends who butcher them for me cause i don’t know anything about processing the meat afterward and plus i raise them from chicks and just could NOT kill them. The people who do this are just normal farmers and don’t use machines to butcher so its humanely ended. It horrifies me that people can factory farm these birds as they have such hardiness. They are a bit messier than other chickens cant be cooped cause of it and must be raised on pasture. Now no one has to go vegetarian now people can go to feed stores online or any hatcheries and ask for the CORNISH ROCK CROSS BROILER CHICKENS They mature rapidly and you are helping my raising free range birds so just by raising and eating 2 birds to birds less you buy from factory farms! These chickens are the #1 meat bird out of all types. Maybe your town doesn’t allow livestock, wait here’s something else you can do go to your market or grocery store and look or ask the employee for free ranged poultry and livestock. This will cost more but is worth it paying 2$ highest for a humanly raised healthy chicken. I hope this helps and you all choose to do this and decrease the amount of factory farmed chickens!

Comment #26 was approved in the spirit of free discourse, but, at least in this moderator’s opinion, it would be nice if, on a post that talks about how chickens are exploited and killed, we could do without the hype on the superiority of the chickens one raises and slaughters for meat. Our intention was to have our readers think about the lives of animals. Factory farming represents one of the extremes of animal exploitation and harm, but to use this particular space to promote any killing of animals (“now no one has to go vegetarian”) is, to say the least, far beside the point.

Cows and Chickens and Pigs are nothing more than food. They help us survive. What crazy hippie would ever keep them as pets. Everyone who posted has killed a fly. The only difference is that flies can’t be barbecued.

I have 4 chickens as pets – and unless you have any you cannot say it is crazy to keep them!!! How could you know how lovely they are, unless you have some?? Seriously think about what you say before you put it on a website!

Actually Chris, the consumption of cows and chickens is of no benefit to anyone, particularly the animals. Do some research about animal agriculture and you’ll find that it’s bad for our health, very bad for the environment and extremely cruel. Even the United Nations acknowledges how much harm it does and that the transition to a plant-based diet is ESSENTIAL if we’re to feed the world’s ever increasing population. I don’t believe we should eat animals. If that makes me a crazy hippie, I care not a jot. At least I’m not an ignorant and mindless consumer with no compassion for others.

We have needs and animals have needs think about how’d you’d like to spend a month in a cage? you wouldn’t be able to do what we have to survive, animals to this day suffer from cruel people just in life to be rich. And There not food there a living creature GOD put on the earth, you mindless jerk.

I disagree. i have pet chickens- and it is not the same as a fly. i dont eat my chickens- i just raise them and love them. So- consider me a hippie- and consider me crazy- but there are diffrences – and they are not only food- they are animals- JUST LIKE YOU. we are animals – with the exeption that we can talk and are able to talk and are a advanced speices.

It’s obvious that the state of welfare of an animal influences the quality of it’s egg and meat. It’s in our own interest to keep our animals in safe, clean and respectable conditions, if not just for the animals sake for ours too.

I understand that the treatment of animals is harsh, but something my mom said made me think:”Well, either way,one(the chicken) has to die in order for the other(people) to live, & that’s what God said we can do.But what I don’t agree with is the treatment and abuse towards the chickens.But what can we do? Being vegan doesn’t appeal to alot of people.

Why does the chicken have to die? Whose life depends on eating a chicken?

I find this Bible verse interesting. It concerns what God told Adam and Eve in the garden:

Genesis 1:29 And God said, Behold I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat.

Immediately preceding this verse is the one in which God gives dominion over the earth to Adam and Eve:

Genesis 1:28 And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”

Sounds to me that God gave them dominion and then directions on how to use it. He didn’t say, “Here are the animals: now live off them.” It sounds like “dominion” has nothing to do with using animals for food; it has to do with humankind having stewardship over the earth, and it could mean something very different from what meat-eaters want it to mean.

Leaving aside what the Jewish and Christian conception of a god wants people to eat, if being vegan is unappealing to a lot of people, I wonder why just as many people don’t think eating the flesh and blood of dead animals is even more unappealing.

God put anamils on this earth for many reasons and one happens to be the provied food for millons so dont get mad about it it finefor that to happen if we didnt eat them then the whould ger eaten by sonthing eles. if chikens whete at the top of the food chain then you would not feed so sorry for them when thet where eating you it is the natural other for this to bee like that and if you dont like it you can eat your vegie bugger away fom me when im having a nice plat of chiken fingers!!!!!!!!!

Firstly, Steven Knox, please learn to spell and punctuate so we can better understand your ill-informed rant. Secondly, God didn’t “put anamils on this earth” at all, let alone for our consumption. The rest of your blather is just plain silly. (You be careful not to choke on one of those “chiken fingers” ya hear? 😉 )

Why do you ask that people eat their veggie burgers away from you—do you find it gross? Maybe you’d like to think about why a veggie burger offends your sensibilities, but the murder and slicing up of chickens is A-OK. Seems a little sick to me, frankly.

For people like me, I am a vegetarian. I am also 13. I do not believe in “God”, because that is all the meat-eaters excuse is that God put animals on earth for that reason?! To be contained in tight spaces, stunned, sliced down spines, slit necks, and slaughtered for humans content? It is completely INHUMANE and horrifying!!! Plus, chickens evolved to eat insects and seeds, things like that, and what kind of excuse is that?! “if chickens started eating us…” Pathetic. Veggie burgers by the way are much healthier and taste exactly like regular meat products, they also have things like veggie bacon, chicken, anything you can imagine.
Many people say being vegan or vegetarian is disgusting, but tell me, we eat the same things you do that don’t have the rotted carcasses of slaughtered, bloody animal parts, or come from the animals put through suffering for your “health”. Our very first ancestors thrived off nuts, berries, roots and vegetables. It is true that there are much more people today than before, but there seems to be enough things for us vegetarians and vegans to eat for protein and such. Many people think cows, chickens and pigs are not “beautiful” and “attractive” like horses (I think ALL animals are ADORABLE) well before you chomp out of a McDonald’s Big Mac, just remember about 90% of that carcass is either horse and beef or mostly just horse, that is a proven fact.

P.S.S. to Steven Knox, try to spell a little better and maybe people will think of you a little more “professionally.”

I am not trying to be mean, but otherwise, I am determined to help all animals, no matter what size or condition, and will continue to be a vegetarian my whole life and try my absolute best for vegan in the future. Not only is it something to believe, but it is a FACT animals should never have to be treated in madness like this and should have rights, and even the same rights, as the fellow creatures (people) who live and thrive right beside them and have lived together for centuries, until we turned on them.

~Thank you, and here’s a quote by someone I found on animal cruelty/abuse:

“The question is, not can they reason, now can they talk, but rather can they suffer.” ~Jeremy Bentham

Administrator @ 35
While I can empathsize with your sentiment, we are not in Eden anymore. We could only wish we were and I think perhaps that kind of wishful thinking is what turns some to a vegan ideology.

In Genesis 9:3, God told Noah and his sons (with their wives) the sole survivors of the flood, “Every moving thing that liveth shall be meat for you; even as the green herb have I given you all things.” You can read more there, but it includes all the beasts, fowls, and fishes.

Did God lose his compassion for the animals? I don’t think so. Did he purpose man to be cruel and wicked toward them? Certainly not.

In the law given to Moses, the Lord forbid certain meats. He gave this law to bring knowledge of sin and for a schoolmaster to lead us unto Christ who cleansed us from unrighteousness by his own body and blood, thus purifying all meats as is evident in his words to Peter in Acts and scriptures such as 1 Cor. 10:25 as examples.

God certainly does require kindness, compassion and care from man for the animals, but there is no redemption from our sin in veganism. Redemption is in Christ alone.

Ugh this stuff is nauseating. I actually used to eat eggs from the grocery store til I found out how awful the chickens are treated, now I cant help but puke just thinking about them. Fortunately a local farmer whose chickens are ethically raised sells eggs near my place so i can still enjoy eggs without anyone having to be harmed

lol i bet 1 day 5000000000000000000000000000 billion chickens cows horses pigs and others are gonna kill all you people that kill aka SLAGHTER!!! THEM AND THEY HAVE RIGHT PEOPLE THEY HAVE RIGHT THERE GONNA GET YOU BACK SOMEDAY! SO WATCH OUT!!

y’know what? go dig a hole and die in it slaughter people. If i or any of you guys become president make this ****stop. i love chickens and all other farm animals. all animals to be exact. if you hate this. you’ll hate what they’re doing to pigs cows and more.

Thank you, Nellie! Congratulations on going vegetarian. I’m glad the article is helping motivate you. 🙂 If you need more motivation, check out our other articles on the lives farm animals. To find them, just click on the tag “Food and Farm Animals” at the bottom of this post. Best of luck!

I feel so bad for these factory farmed chickens. Pictures of these cooped up and spend their entire lives like this. It is difficult to understand that these chickens will never see light or day. I am a firm believer of raising your own chickens which are more healthy and fun as well. I think we will see a big shift real soon of the cons of farmed raised chickens

I’m only ten and I quit eating chickens. NO CHICKEN FOR ME. AT ALL. How do people possibly act like this? Who says they can treat poor, helpless chickens like that? It’s not right!!! I’m hoping that chickens will have a better future.
p.s people make fun of them too (chicken dance)

I agree with you Kory. I’m 11 and I’m a total fan of chickens and it makes me so angry and sad to see chickens in this state for their whole entire lives. It’s so cruel and they deserve a better future.

Good for you Jin! I wrote an essay on factory farming a couple of years ago. It isn’t just chickens that are being abused like this though, it’s also cows, pigs and other animals. I also raise my own chickens, so I know how they need their space. And, just adding, fresh farm eggs taste much better than factory farmed eggs. The thing I don’t understand is why the Government doesn’t do anything about this!! It sickens me to know that I’ve eaten at fast food restoraunts that serve that kind of food. I’ve tried multiple times to become a vegetarian but I always eat meat no matter how hard I try. I’m almost 13 years old right now, and I hate it that I understand why the government doesn’t shut down factory farming completely. I also hope more people recognize how chickens support the U.S.

I am such a vintage diva and I must say I am now very siuprrsed at myself for not gussying up my chicken coop. I have Cochin hens, an Aracauna hen and a Leghorn rooster. They are pets who all have names and free range during the day. They meet us in the driveway every afternoon for their treats. On weekends, when we are at home, they come to the side porch several times a day for treats aka..bread. We are in need of a new coop for our little flock (collectively, we call them the Clampetts )and now I can’t wait to start on it! I have a vintage decor shop for some reason, it just never occured to me to go that route for my coop I will now I LOVE it!!!

..poor chickens.. it’s so sad looking at these.. there should be a proper way in handling these chickens, which can be considered humane.. and at least tolerable.. i hope these people can feel how these chickens have suffered with all the torture and agony that is going on..

I’m sorry but if you are vegan you are most likely supporting industrialized food. Support the right farmers, the ones that know how to use nature. Eating meat is part of the circle of life, but eating meat from factories is NOT. Read/learn about the really good farmers out there. THe animals are part of the process, they help fertilize the soil and clean it up. Then we eat them, then one day we go into the ground for plants to eat us.

But “Industrialized food,” whatever that may mean, is not what’s at issue. Animal cruelty is. Based on what you’ve said, eating meat is not part of the circle of life, either. It is not necessary for us to eat animals for all those things like fertilization and cleaning up the soil (not sure what you meant by that) to happen. Animals have their own lives to live, and if they die naturally without having been killed and eaten by humans, they still go into the soil and fertilize it.

I have chickens of my own and they are living the life fresh grass every day fruit and vegetable scraps and a nice big cage if in person i saw this happening i would take every one of them home with me including the males that get “sufficated and gased” yeah what jerks you should be ashamed of your self if your going to kill them let themat least live in a stable clean enviormant because while i do enjoy chicken and no i dont kill my chickens for food i dont see the need to make them suffer and i hope and PRAY that the people who do this see all these comments

Im sorry but have to say that I have no problem with this at all. what you fail to realise is that these chickens would not exist if they were not used for battery farming. Food is a fuel and every single one of us needs it and regarding free range argument people on the bread line can not afford to pay the price for free range so this process feeds a need in the market

I am vegetarian and I do believe that what they do is evil but think about the people who earn their bread from this job, if you are human enough to think about the chicken think about the people too. Though what they are doing is really bad.

I think chickens deserve the right to live in their natural habitats and exactly, if given the decision chickens WOULD NOT pick a tiny, wire caged compared to large, free spaces to roam free. this is not fair SAVE THE CHICKENS !!

i hate does guys thath let all those chikens sufer you are only killing them and eating them wath did the chikens ever do stop just thinking about buisnnes and money you are killing lots and lots of inisint creatures

I can’t believe people now a days are so heartless!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
What did they ever do to us!!!!!!! This is why I’m a vegetarian!!!!!!! Started yesterday, and after reading this, well, I’m defidently gonna stay one!!!!
If I was aloud I’d take some chickens home, but my parents would never allow it!!!!!!!!!!!!! Any ideas on convinsing them? BTW we don’t have a farm or anything… but I’d do anything for one of them!!!!!!

all people are creatures of extremes. there are people out there that are cruel to their animals, and there are others that carry pet insurance for their chickens… the right thing is somewhere in between… people should be careful to not impress their human need onto the animal(s) in question. articles such as this one is an editorial describing the conditions from a human need perspective and not an animal need perspective. many researchers, from many universities, located all over the world have spent countless hours and dollars to determine optimal animal production while meeting animal need. these researchers are not in the animal business to be cruel… read some research before making an opinion.

While your faith in the good intentions of people who make their livings from the use of animals is notable, your assertion that we are unfamiliar with researching subjects before writing on them is unfounded and, in fact, just your opinion.

The workers don\’t like it, they are illegal immigrants brought over from Mexico. In Mexico they can\’t find a job, so at least in the US they can make a few bucks. (they are payed below minimum wage) They can\’t say anything about it or else they will be deported.

I wish we could abolish animal farming for the most part except for dairy or egg. Think of all the tech we’ve got now, if we were responsible (no abuse / overuse) with it, hunting would be a cinch! And hopefully it would improve our lives.

In fact, anymore I look critically at agriculture. Sure, it may be necessary if we would be looking to go into deep space (esp if we could manufacture an artifical environment), but was it really necessary for us to exist until now? Just maybe it was…

I dont know whats more digusting,the way you kill the chickens or THE PEOPLE WHO KILL THEM! Im only 11 but I know people cant hurt animals like that. A saying that I like “If all factory farms were made of glass, everyone would be vegetarian”.YOU HEAR THAT STEVEN KNOX!!!!

Grinding baby male chicks, basically putting hens in jail, making unhealthy food for us to eat, WHAT IS WRONG WITH THESE PEOPLE!!!!!!!!!!! They should be put in jail! All things have a right to live! They have as much right as we do! How would anyone like to be put in a tiny cage with six other people and have your head cut off! We need to do something! I’m ten, and my school has chickens. I’m never eating a chicken again!!!!! Now if only I could get my dad to be a vegetarian…

Things like this disgust me, I have chicks on order, and a large run and hen house for them. I am excited for them to eat worms and dig at the ground and in my gardens, if they wish to go broody than they will. The thought of going through another drive through fast food and eating chicken makes me feel nausious, I hope to spread the word as well, the best form of protest is not purchasing the eggs from these poor birds!

There’s always the option of not eating chickens or their eggs.
But, who are the people you know who complain and don’t do anything about it? Be specific. Because we put up this website, I wrote an article, and I gave a number of links for further information and to encourage others to take action. I have been vegan for 12 years and have leafletted and participated in other activism. What else should I do? I am open to suggestions.

I have got 4 chickens and i love them so much! they all had different personalities and were all wonderful… All a chicken needs is a home where there are people taking care of them. When we now have to kill them… why cant we let them live happy and be free before they have to be killed. i think killing animals is a horrible thing to do… Everyone has 1 life, cant they be able to live it well? How can someone be so cruel? 🙁

Does anyone have any knowledge if “Centurion Poultry Inc.” supports factory farming and battery? I have tried contacting them directly. They have a location just a couple seconds from my home and if this is some factory farm BS operation I will be spending some time getting it shut down. Thanks.

I am in grade 7 and I am doing a talk on battery farming and I was wondering if anyone would like to help me with my school project, to summaries the whole paragraph that has been provided in the privies review for me. I need to explain how this is bad……. and to also leave my fellow students with an understanding after talking about how battery farming is so bad and how it effects us.

Well, I’m touched by this and i really feel bad for em’. But i love to eat that stuff and i can’t help it. You know when we go to most of the food chains, It’s easy to order non veg. But when it comes to vegetarian, It’s kind of difficult to order because of very few items available.

THIS IS NOT FAIR!!! THEY DESERVE THIS! SAVE THE PIGS SAVE THE CHICKENS SAVE EVERY ANIMAL IN FACTORY FARMS!! look up “make it possible” donate some money dont but ANY! caged eggs or factory farm products!! make a difference.. stop factory farming:(

WHY DO THEY HAVE TO BE SO CRUEL!!!!!!!!!!!! ALL THOSE ANIMALS HAVE FEELING TOO!! THEY FEEL PAIN! THEY DONT WANT TO BE COOPED UP IN A CAGE…PLEASE JUST BE KIND TO THE ANIMALS DONATE I WAN THEM TO BE FREE AND LOVED BY US NOT SLAUGHTERED AND MISTREATED!! we can all make a difference… im asking u to just stop eating meat and stop buying caged eggs!! please i am serious about this i am not eating meat im not a vegetarian but i will not eat factory farm meat or caged eggs! please stop and think about those animals.
think about this… right now a cow, chicken turkey or pig could be being slaughtered or tortured.
make a difference…stop factory farming:(

I wish that were possible, but there is no way that that many male chicks could find homes. Assuming that half the chicks born each year in the egg-laying industry are male, think about the fact that 300 million hens are in battery cages right now. That means about 300 million males need to be either saved or killed. I can’t imagine any way in which the industry would be able to save the males, even if they wanted to, which, obviously, they don’t. It’s too costly for them to do anything but kill them. And there’s also the fact that almost nobody wants roosters—there’s no financial or culinary advantage to having them (because they don’t lay eggs), and they make a lot of noise. It’s very sad.

these are living things!! lives treated like trash for our enjoyment! I eat chicken but after this and watching Food Inc. on netflix and also on youtube I am sick about it! Nothing should be treated this way! Who gives them the right!!

I have pet chickens too. I am not a vegan. This is just terrible the way they treat the chickens! I love chickens as much as y’all do and I think they should have way better living conditions and new laws should be enforced in how these animals are treated.

I believe there are some serious philosophical problems within the animal rights movement. Most importantly, the basis for animal rights seems to be based on emotion rather than on intellectual thought. Indeed, why do animals have rights but plants do not? Is it because animals are more similar to humans? Or should we not inquire about the logical validity of our emotional responses? It may do this website’s commenters some good if they were to calmly analyze their own philosophy rather than make cruel moralistic judgments upon others.

I’m a backyard poultry keeper. This is beyond cruelty! Any animal that breathes should never ever have to suffer from such conditions or from the hands of such stupidity … These people running these chicken factory farms should be placed in small cages and treated the same way these people are treating these chicks and chickens! IF IT HAS A BRAIN AND A HEART IT HAS FEELINGS TOO!!!

Where can I find factual info about how KOSHER chickens — for meat or eggs -are raised? IOW, are they treated the same as the factory-farmed ones in this article, or is there a requirement that they be treated humanely?

this is terrible the way they treat chickens!
i was a non veg but after knowing all this i am now a veg.
these chickens are innocent and this is beyond cruelty! i do not like what is happening! their feathers are falling cause of weakness! this is very terrible
i love chickens and little baby chickens! and these people don’t have the right to treat chickens like this.
they die cause of diseases and these people are not taking care of them properly.
i want help these poor chickens even though i am 10
i don’t think these people have feelings for animals!!!

Things like this is horrible!!! If people are going to raise animals for meat they should raise them on a nice farm not this dungeon. I’m not a vegetarian but it’s wrong to do this. People should know where there food comes from and how people say it’s “free range chickens”. I was selling eggs one day and my customer said her daughter asked if the egg came from a real chicken I mean seriously??. How could someone have the hart to kill an innocent animal. It is horrible!!

it,s batter to educate the farmer not not gave him hard time espicale most of them have contract with chiicken company for information farmer sale chicken 70 cent and company sale kilo $4 , it,s not fare for farmer , which it was control by big company if you some thing wrong tray to fix but destroy chicken farmer all farmer safer some of gave up and sale the farm is that what you want and price go up because short chicken i wish to more kind

I cannot believe this. I am a vegetarian first of all, and I am very glad that I do not support this by eating them, but I am still enraged that they treat these chickens as if they are literally not alive animals, this is sick and extremely unjust. There has got to be a law put foreward about animal cruelty during hervesting because this is definetely worse than just plain animal abuse, yet the government seems fine with it. >:(

If God gave dominion of animals to man than what a proud mother/father God must be to have birthed Hitler^666.

I’m not vegan, though I have dialed down my consumption dramatically. I don’t feel overly guilty for enjoying meat, nor do I take the stance the practice should stop entirely. As we are unable to cease killing and harming ourselves with cruel and inventive imagings in record numbers what hope is there really for other species?

The way we treat them matters as much as the way we treat ourselves. The mechanics of physical pain and emotional pain are not going to be much different if at all with any mammal to man. Whats missing is maybe (maybe not) the sense of self and (definately) comfort to sit back and study and learn instead of instinct.

Let someone cut off your nose and stand in a small unlit pantry for a year as they slide the hard ends of bread loafs under. If you come out happy and don’t want to obliterate everything that you see for all time absent logic stolen than its perfectly ok to do it to all the creatures you like. If your not willing to have it done, you shouldn’t accept its doing.

Man claims mastery over the earth, though the title belongs to various microorganisms. Heres rooting for them, if we won’t change in life we will change in death at least nature promises that for equality. We’ve had a nice pyscho run of it, only a matter of going off the cliff now because face it guys the insane species of man will never cease nor tire of his own inequity until said cliff see’s us out of the race.

Chickens in the meat industry typically spend their lives confined to warehouse-like buildings, each packed with as many as 20,000 chickens. On average, the space per chicken is only slightly larger than a sheet of letter-size paper. This crowding can result in scratches and sores from the birds being forced to walk all over each other.

This is just plain DISCUSTING why I have no idea I. The world why sweet, sensible, soul filled animals are kicked and shoved into crates!!!???? This is ABUSE at every single LEVEL what has humanity come to?? Why do we think we are higher and posh things in the world who don\’t relize that we are animals as well and we are not all that great. animals should be LOVED, RESPECTED AND LIVE TO THE FULLEST WITHOUT PAIN OR STRESS.THESE ARE ANIMALS!!!!!! THEY HAVE FEELINGS IF YOU DONT THONK SO WHACH A VEDIO OF WORKERS KICKING COWS CHICKENS AND PIGS AND YOU WILL HEAR THEIR SCREAMS OF AGONY PAIN AND SUFFERING THEY WANT TO GET THE **** Out of there this is just disgusting …… Support ANIMALS NOW!!!! And you people who think that these are just plain old, things that can\’t feel pain and don\’t care and are just ganna accepted the fact that these beautiful sweet creatures are being MAULED KICKED SHOCKED SHOVED AND THROWN. Well then I HOPE YOU GO TO HELL YOU UNSESIBLE PEICES OF GARBAGE YOU SHOULD HAVE NEVER BEEN BORN I LOVE ANIMALS AND ABSOLUTELY LOVE CHICKENS AND ANY OTHER ANIMAL IM THE WORLD . Support animals today GO TO PETA.com DONATE PLEASE THESE ANIMALS ARE COUNTING ON GOID LOVING PEOLOE!!!

You couldn’t have said it better. I couldnt agree more. I am 50 years old and I have been mostly vegetarian since I was about 16 years old. Since education my self about the poultry industry, it just breaks my heart that I was contributing to that all these years because I was still consuming chicken and eggs and a little bit of cheese. Never again though. It just didn’t dawn on me that a baby calve had to be yanked from its mother when it is 24-36 hours old just so I could eat cheese. Most of the male calves are killed or sold for veal. With the female calves the dairy nightmare just continues. Back to the chickens, I’m am building a spacious chicken coop with a chicken run, so that I can have a few laying hens. That way if I am temped to eat a couple eggs, they will at least come from happy chickens. I can’t remember the guys name above, but he said chicken don’t have souls. They are just here for food. That is not true, they may not have spirits like humans but they do have souls. Humans are destroying the planet. Animals aren’t. We have some bad karma coming. Very sad.

what if you were a chicken?! how would you like to be locked up in a small wire cage with thousands of others crammed into one massive place!! this is so uncivilized and not fair. have a better attitude and SAVE THE CHICKENS FOR GOODNESS SAKE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :/

Poor for the chickens they no longer have the digging for feeding, no longer nesting process to incubate chicks, raising chicks. Thus wild chicken will gradually extinct. I think these chickens will not survive when released from the wild.

Very sad and makes it easy for me to turn away from eating meat. Sometimes I see and read these stories and wonder how different is it from the inhumane people that are torturing and trophy killing? Why do any of these animals have to suffer and die?

Taking care of chicks is extremely difficult, thank you for sharing the experience of caring for chicks for the best development. This will be very useful information to help me raise chickens better. I will always by your side.